Epiphany, Candlemas, and Pre-Lent

The season of Epiphany began on 6 January with both a culmination and a beginning.  The actual feast day  concludes our Christmastide imagery with the visit of the three kings (Magi, Astrologers, Kings,… or whatever scholars are currently saying), manifesting Christ’s glory to the Gentile world.  Epiphany’s falling 12 days after Christmas is seen in such diverse places as Shakespeare’s play “Twelfth Night” and in the popular song “The 12 Days of Christmas”, and many of us leave our Christmas decorations intact until 6 January (also known in some cultures as “little Christmas”).  This finale to Christmas is also the start of the Epiphany season, traditionally marked by three events:  the visitation of the Wise Men, Christ’s baptism by St. John Baptist in the Jordan river, and Jesus’ first miracle of turning water into wine at the marriage in Cana.  The most topical of our hymns celebrate the Gospel for the feast day itself, with such favorites as “From the eastern mountains” (particularly descriptive, that one!), “As with gladness men of old” and “Brightest and best of the stars of the morning”, this last analogizing the star over Bethlehem with Jesus, the “bright and morning star”.  Detailed examination of these great texts show that they not only comment on aspects of the events themselves, but further exhort the believer to be drawn to Christ as the Wise Men were drawn to the Star.   

The official Epiphany season is concluded by singing the hymn “Alleluia, song of gladness” on the final Sunday after Epiphany, this year falling on 9 February. This great medieval text was translated in the nineteenth century by the Anglican priest and scholar John Mason Neale, and its words speak of the eternal city of Jerusalem, and the perpetual joy of singing “Alleluia”, both within its walls and in anticipation of its return to earth in heavenly form.  In the midst of this exaltation, however, it also refers to us as “mourning exiles” who “for a time give o’er”, an elegant analogy of our entering into the Lenten season fast approaching   In four powerful stanzas we are brought from the extrovert beauty of the Christmas/Epiphany season into a final preparation for Lent; in essence, our focus is redirected in a manner both elegant and simple, a kind of brief synopsis of the upcoming Pre-Lent season.

     One of the benefits of following a year-long liturgical calendar is that a great feast day can fall on a Sunday, thus gaining greater emphasis by the hymns, organ and choral music proper to that day.  And so we are able this year to celebrate the Solemnity of the Purification of the Virgin on Sunday 2 February, a feast that is also known as the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple.  A more commonly used name is Candlemas, as the candles to be used during the church year are blessed at this Mass, in accordance with Simeon’s proclamation that this child is the “light to enlighten the Gentiles”, as found in the Gospel of St. Luke.  The calendar date of forty days after Christmas gives this celebration not only a final look back to the birth of Christ, but also emphasizes the growth of daylight as we move out of winter darkness.

      Just as Epiphany culminates Christmas and yet also begins its own season, the ending of the Epiphany season also ushers in a transition of its own as well, which we call the Pre-Lenten season.  This consists of the three Sundays before Ash Wednesday, and it serves as a way to transition out of the Christmas/Epiphany focus and move into a Lent/Easter mindset.  Each Sunday marks the progress toward Easter, being respectively 70, 60, and 50 days prior to our Easter celebration, and they are a fitting preparation for the spiritual disciplines of Lent.  Many churches have discarded this mini-season, the argument being that since Lent is already a preparation for Easter, why do we need another one as a “preparation for a preparation”, as it were.  But how mistaken this is!  A healthy observation of Lent involves many types of disciplines, both of body and spirit, all of which are well served by a period of focus and preparation, and our Pre-Lenten season provides exactly that.  The readings and hymns all serve to make a smooth transition in our worship from the extrovert joy of Epiphany to the solemn rigors of a holy Lent.  Perhaps the Oxford Movement priest Edward Pusey summed this up most succinctly when he named these three Sundays as constituting “the vestibule of Lent”.  The first of the three pre-Lent Sundays, Septuagesima Sunday, will this year fall on 16 February.

-Steven McDonald

The service of sung Evensong is a hallmark of traditional Anglican worship, being heard in it’s most beautiful form in the choral versions offered in the cathedrals and college chapels of England. The psalms, the evening canticles Magnificat and Nunc dimittis, and well-known eventide hymns all combine to create a service of quiet contemplation, a perfect foil to the often chaotic events of daily life, and a fitting way to conclude one’s busy day.

A fine commentary on Evensong comes from the Rev. Michael Till, from 1970-1981 the Dean of King’s College Chapel, Cambridge, England:

“If you are prepared to join in this turning towards God, you will find this is a Service in which you can join, though perhaps in ways that are unfamiliar. Here is a liturgical, architectural, and musical space into which, without fretting too much about the words, you may gather the preoccupations and anxieties of your own life and hold them together with a recollection of the god whose acts we celebrate. But many have found that once they have quietly offered the preoccupations which are chattering in their minds, they are free silently to go on to offer to God all that they are.”

Evensong services at Trinity Church combine hymns, congregational settings of the canticles, and organ music to give utterance to this most distinctive of Anglican liturgies, and our first Evensong will take place on Friday, 11 October, at 5:00 PM.

The music of the historic Anglican church, like the beliefs themselves, reflect the practices and traditions of a reformed catholic faith. Although the actual church was founded in 1534 by King Henry VIII, its music draws from European traditions of both pre- and post-reformation times, as well as having developed music for its own particular forms of worship. Hymns, music for choir, and works for organ form the heart of the Anglican musical identity.

At Trinity Church, congregational singing is the focus of our music, with the hymns, Mass settings, and canticles all being found in the Hymnal 1940. This book has long been acknowledged as the finest hymnal of the twentieth century, and all historical musical styles are well represented: Medieval plainchant, Reformation-era chorales and Psalm-tones, well-known Victorian hymns, and tunes from the early 1900’s are all found in this most versatile book. Numerous hymns are sung during Matins, Mass, and Evensong, as well as musical settings of the texts of the canticles and Mass Ordinary, all of which shows a high level of congregational participation in the service, something that the Reformers valued highly.

The organ music heard in the service occurs at the start (to set a mood of prayer and contemplation), the Offertory (for additional reflection following the sermon) and at the conclusion (to usher the congregation out into the world). These works are selected from the great heritage of music specifically written for the organ, and from the hands of such composers as Bach, Couperin, Mendelssohn, and many others. At Trinity, such pieces are often ones in which one of the hymn tunes used in worship can be heard as a solo melody, thus giving an additional “hearing” of the hymn in a new musical guise.

The music heard at Trinity Church illuminates the service in ways that are both gentle and reflective, as well as extrovert and proclamatory, living proof that the “beauty of holiness” can be found in a small neighborhood parish church as well as in a great cathedral.